


Wait For It

by tulomne



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Hamilton quotes abound, Just a lot of sad shit about Kenobi, Reflection, Time between III and VI
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-07
Updated: 2016-10-07
Packaged: 2018-08-20 00:09:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8229481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tulomne/pseuds/tulomne
Summary: The suns set on Tattooine. It's late.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this a while ago. I had a lot of feelings about Obi-Wan that needed to be straightened out. Set between episodes III and VI, while Obi-Wan watches over Luke.
> 
> I haven't read the Kenobi novel yet so I'm gonna claim ignorance to what happens during this time period anyways...

It’s late. The desert is shrouded in partial darkness, the intensity of the moon and stars reminding those on Tattooine that the suns’ light is only several hours away. There was a time when Obi-Wan knew what constellations lay before him without looking. He knew the ships entering and leaving the atmosphere down to the hour, and their purposes. These days his attention is entirely grounded. The only light he follows is that of the Lars residence, burning faintly in the night.

He’s worn not with age, but loss. His hair white, his beard thin. There’s not much to do now that his body is beginning to betray him. Sit. Wait. And wonder.

His thoughts go to her, they always do.

What would have happened if he had turned away? Renounced the Order to be with her? Because it’s all he’s ever known. Even now, living in exile, he clings to the only remains of the Order he can find. Still listening to Qui-Gon, still watching over Luke. It’s his only identity, and he holds on to this purpose.

Would Qui-Gon still be alive if he had run? Would Anakin have remained undiscovered? How much of the universe would have gone untouched if he had given in? Had she said the word?

Sometimes he catches glimpses, fleeting touches or a whisper caught in the air. But Satine was never Force sensitive, and he knows it's nothing but the wind that whips about the canyons

What he can feel of the Force is shifting, knows that underneath all that corruption, underneath all that rot he can still tell its owner is that of Luke’s father. Obi-Wan can feel the anger brimming on the edge of the Force, likes to believe he’s not as irrational, not as impulsive, as emotional as his Padawan, but he knows emotions such as these are not as foreign as the Jedi Order wanted them to be.

He’s angry, thinking of how Anakin had what he couldn’t and threw it all away. He’s jealous, that Anakin was able to hold Padme the way he only dreamt of with Satine. He’s terrified, of what he could’ve become if he had taken the same path as his long lost friend.

Because he had been so _good_ , staying loyal to the order as Satine had to her people. They took the selfless paths, the righteous ones, and they still lost.

It’s unfair he has to pay the same price as someone who had gone against the Jedi ways. Satine made the sacrifice for a risk they never took. His only time spent holding her was when he watched the light go out of her eyes, just as he had with Padme. His heart aches at the fear in Padme’s eyes. Her last breaths declaring her unwavering devotion, just as Satine’s had.

He knows his and Anakin’s lives parallel more than he’d like to admit.

Perhaps that was his downfall. Assuming that Anakin could take the wisdom he bestowed, the same which Qui-Gon had given to him, and use it to become the man his former master had wanted him to be. Obi-Wan gave him everything, devoted his life to Anakin in a way he could never do so outside of the Order, and it was rejected for acting on emotions that Obi-Wan knew all too well.

He knows he should do something to stop him. But his body is old and his mind is fleeting, and he knows that the most and best he can do is keep the boy away from his father.

Because there’s something about Luke, something like the crisp air in the dew soaked forests of Onderon, like the tension before an ambush or a forbidden kiss, that makes him believe something’s about to happen, and he will wait for what Luke will become.

There has to be an explanation why he’s thrown his life away time and time again. There has to be an answer for why he had to watch the light go out of Satine’s eyes, even after picking the path that should have led to least violence. There has to be a purpose for why he’s here, now, watching over the son of two best friends, both dead and gone for all intents and purposes. If there’s a reason he’s still alive, when so many have died, he’s willing to wait for it.

The lights go out in the Lars home. It’s late.


End file.
